Montana Books

This is not a coffee table book. Nor is it a book to be wasted on a library shelf. The photographs and brief accompanying text are meant to be consumed slowly, revisted, again revisted, appreciated like two fingers of old sour mash sipped during the bleak. It is irrelevant that a few of the photographs appear slightly grainy. What the artist brilliantly captures are facets of modesty and humility among a gracious people who, by choice, live a somewhat remote, sometimes trying life.

Once in awhile, you find a book that outstrips others and stands on its' own. This isn't the glam photography of Annie Liebowitz, the sexually overt Herb Ritts, nor is it the intentionally odd portraiture of Diane Arbus. This is an artist in the same league as Ansel Adams, Richard Avedon, Galen Rowell, and Phil Borges. Simply put, Laura Wilson is a thoughtful artist, whose vision and understanding are the product of a level of artistic and a respect for history that few others show. If there is one word that stands above all it is this: craft.

This book is the result of years of visiting and slowly getting to know the Hutterites, not an easy task. A friend of Richard Avedon, Laura Wilson's greatness and strength show up in her photos which depict the people as they are. If you can, buy them all! Her work is an education in the type of commitment it takes to make and pursue fine art.

Laura Wilson's photographs are truly extraordinary. I first was introduced to them by a recent essay on the PBS News Hour. The few photograps that were shown left me mesmerized and eager to see more. The presentation of the photographs in the book, however, is extremely disappointing. Rather than helping the photographs, the layout gets in the way. Several of the best photos are split between two pages ( e.g., the photo of the women on the haystacks is split 75%/25%). Also, many of the photos are blown up so large that graininess becomes a significant problem.

Laura Wilson's photographs deserve a far better presentation than they are given in this volume.

Kari Swenson was abducted by a mountain man father/son team as she hiked alone on an isolated trail in the thickness of the country growth at Big Sky, Montana, as she trained for the Olympics event she meant to win. They treated her abusively in the rough mountain way as she pleaded to be released. The old man, Don Nichols, asked his son, "Shall we keep her?" Danny nodded, with "Yeah, let's keep her."

This drama played out for five months while the first rescuer was killed on Moonlight Creek in the wild forest, so close to Big Sky. "Remembering a tragedy is always painful." The long manhunt and eventual capture of the kidnappers ended peaceably due to the expertise of Sheriff Johnny France. This "drama of the confrontation between the Sheriff and the fugitives is as exciting as any fiction" and it is "a tale of high adventure in real life."

At the first trial in Virginia City where cowboys drink coffee and other liquids at Bettie's Cafe, Danny was not found guilty of murder because his father was the one who shot Al Goldstein. The district judge is described as a crusty old Southerner who 'ran a tight court' who felt that the younger man should have been found guilty as well because the murder had occurred during the course of the original felony. But the jury of rural Montana didn't see it that way. Dan got the maximum sentence to be served at the hardrock prison at Deerlodge.

A new trial ended with Don Nichols receiving guilty on both counts, murder and kidnapping and also got the maximum sentence under law. He must serve 42 years before any chance of parole. For a man his age, that is equivalent to the death sentence.

Life goes on at the Mountain Range with hot dry summers and fiercely cold winters. Kari went back to full time training for international biathlon competition, but this time in the Green Hills of Vermont -- but never alone. She was only twenty-three when that happened; today, she would be 44. By now, it is hoped that she has found the peace after such a grueling experience.

In contrast to the other reader, I've known Johnny France since *my* childhood LOL. This is a gripping crime story that also gives a native's glimpse into a community and a way of life that's rapidly changing. Read this as much for a taste of western Montana as it once was as much as for the murder story.

I've know Johnny France since he was a young man. Without his dogged determination, these two killers might not have ever been captured. Don Nichols is still in prison and most likely will never get paroled. This book tells fascinating tale almost too strange to believe in these modern times. Great reading!!

What makes an American Indian and Indian, and why is it important? These are the two overarching questions which inform Professor Harmon's study of the tribes of the Puget Sound region in Washington State from the beginning of the nineteenth century to the present. Combining a narrative description of the events which led to the relative subjugation of tribes and their negotiation of their members status as government wards and American citizens with a legal and economic analysis of the part that native peoples played in Washington state, Harmon goes a good way towards showing how the Amer-Indian identity came to be, why it did. Furthermore, Harmon's study goes a long way in showing how interplay between natives and whites created the situation in which most Indians live today.

This is not only a book about the interplay between whites and Indians though. By showing the intermingling of the various tribes before, during and after their subjugation by the American government, Harmon goes a long way in explaining how Indian identity was created not only by the dominant white societies over generalizing of difference and government sponsored attempts to assimilate most natives, but by the overlapping kinship between tribes (and later with whites). This fact, besides having important legal ramifications that Harmon found herself dealing with as an attorney for the Suquamish tribe in a boundary dispute with the state of Washington in 1980, has extreme relevance for the study of how native peoples in the west have negotiated their existence as both groups and individuals. Also, by exploring the cultural norms of the tribes as they came into contact, Harmon shows how native peoples were able to take advantage of opportunities which the economic development brought in its wake to advance many traditional values associated with having wealth and status. For the natives of the Puget Sound region, as opposed to those on the Prairies or in the East, the expansion was not an unmitigated disaster--though it certainly was not a dinner party either.

Harmon's analysis of Indian history involves creative use of anthropology and historical documentation. In her recreation of life in the Puget Sound region while it was still considered the frontier, Harmon shows a world in which of whites and natives from other areas of North America were seen through the lenses of opportunity, apprehension and simple curiosity. As Harmon explains with regard to the British fur traders--known among the tribes who would come into contact with them as King George men--who came to the region in early nineteenth century, "[a]ccording to local folklore, Europeans at first seemed so different from known humans that Indians supposed them to be animals or creatures from myth time," but, "by the 1820's, natives plainly recognized the King George men as fellow humans, candidates for incorporation into the regional network of human relations (17)." Harmon further demonstrates that for much of the nineteenth century, traders, and later settlers had to acclimate themselves to many of the expectations and values of the native peoples because of the lack of many institutional forms of coercion that would not invite retaliation. Differing attitudes about crime, work habits, spiritual matters, and what to do with the fruits of labor are among the many conflicts that shaped Indian and non-Indian relations during this period and helped to create an Indian identity.

During the twentieth century, most natives came into coercive contact with American institutions in ways that would further advance an Indian identity, and also advance its utility for natives. Most younger Indians found themselves at least for some time at federally backed schools and mission schools with government backing in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Though the goals of these schools was to assimilate natives, they had the unintentional effect of placing a large number of people together whose only unifying feature was their native descent. Harmon writes, "the pupils' interaction helped them formulate a common Indian identity. Diverse as they were, the children were at the schools because the administrators regarded them all as Indians (156)." As much as many of the children and their parents may have, rightfully, resented the treatment that was meted out at these schools, it was unavoidable that the children would gain a sense of identity as non-whites--possibly with divergent or oppositional interests.

It was not inevitable that native peoples' would form an identity that became in some important respects oppositional to the dominant culture. Harmon shows that the native peoples were largely integrated into the economy of Washington state and that discrimination against Indian workers was not a problem until the late 1920's. This was not actually what precipitated the creation of the myriad organizations which would come to represent native interests, nor the reactions of Bureau of Indian Affairs under the tutelage of John Collier--the so called "Indian New Deal"--but these three forces combined to further enforce an Indian sense of difference by way of the dominant society. With World War II uprooting thousands of Indian men for both military service and economic reasons and Washington state's post-war attempts to abrogate treaty rights of several tribes using the (often specious) argument that the tribal entities the treaties were negotiated with no longer existed, Indian identity further crystallized around an understanding of being unfairly exempted from the American dream and being further stripped of rights legally accorded them--rights that many depended on to earn or augment their livelihoods.

Harmon's study is not easy reading--not because of its subject matter or because of any fault of her's as a writer, but because of the amount of knowledge about native history it presumes on the part of the reader. For the reader unfamiliar with native history and western history more specifically, much of this book is difficult fare. Beyond that minor flaw, a flaw unavoidable to any specialized study, the work is an insightful look at what it is to be an Amer-Indian.

Indians in the Making is a comprehensive study of the complicated and ambiguous development of ethnic identity among Indian groups in the Puget Sound region of Washington State. The scope of this work is approximately the early 1800s to 1975, and examines the social, economic, religious, and political developments and entities that attempted to define the native population of this region. Before European contact, Indians saw no need to categorize themselves, and had no basis for comparison. With the influx of traders and, more importantly, immigrants to the region in the mid 19th century, Americans saw the need to sort Indians into groups and separate them from non-Indians. For the first time, Indians found themselves ascribed a certain identity from outside forces. Americans believed it was this ascribed identity that would determine what place Indians would have in the American world. However, due to factors such as constant mobility, intermarriage, intermingling, and dispersed settlements, the distinction between Indians and non-Indians became blurred. Ironically, since the 1880s, U.S. officials "set the parameters of Indian identity for purposes of political and property relations, but they have never monopolized the process of defining `Indian' or `tribe.'" (247) Indians in the Puget Sound region have historically refused to define themselves solely in the terms suggested by their American colonizers. Thus, the historically divergent interests and beliefs of various Indian groups in this region have made efforts to consolidate a Puget Sound Indian identity extremely difficult. In the 20th century, the debate about century old treaty fishing rights helped forge a historical and cultural link between these diverse groups. The "treaty-reserved right to fish became the best expression of their relation to non-Indians, and thus, a cardinal symbol of their own Indianness." (218) However, the idea of what it is to be Indian in this region remains a dynamic process.
Indians in the Making presents a unique study on the idea of "identity." Harmon allows the reader to process events as they were processed by the Indians of Puget Sound. The differences between the ways in which Americans viewed certain actions or relationships and the Indian interpretation are clearly spelled out. This approach provides the other side to the story that is so often missing in Indian History. One aspect that could have been explored further was gender relations. Harmon focused on the interaction between groups of men far more than women, except when discussing intermarriage. Harmon conducted extensive research for this book, and offers almost 100 pages of notes after the text. The historical factors that contributed to Puget Sound Indian identity are thoroughly explored, but the account isn't too laden with details. Harmon examines the Indian identity for what it is, as well as for what it is not. Too often, ethnic identity is defined by the policy makers, but in this case, the author examines the ways in which a group has sought to define themselves.

Dr. Harmon has written a wonderfully crafted work which will be important for future historians of the Pacific Northwest. The story is quite simply about the history of Indian people in the Puget Sound area. Unfortunately, after reading this book, you will no longer see the history of Puget Sound tribes as simple. The history is very complex as the Native peoples and the white explorerers and settlers try to distinguish themselves from each other. In the beginning, George Vancouver could draw a line in the sand to separate the races. It only went downhill from that point especially as the number of interracial marriages began to increase. Who is eligible to be a tribal member? Who can live on the reservation? Are the Indians who live off the reservation truly "Indian"? These are a few of the numerous questions that are raised in this book.

Dr. Harmon has presented a thorough and carefully written work. I would highly recommend it to any student of PNW history or indigenous history buffs. Future historians will have a new benchmark to base their works on. Dr. Harmon provides a wonderful bibliography which is rich with information. This book deserves a home in your library.

Since I personally know the author who is a fellow dispatcher at another agency and am good friends with the real-life "George," I already knew some of the trip that inspired the book. As a writer myself, I must say that this book is extremely well written. Although I don't fancy romance novels, I did like this, although the steamy scenes were too explicit for me and I didn't like the adulterous theme. But over all, it was a good book. Good debut, Claudia! I also must add that Claudia Thomas is a wonderful woman. She recently served as a critical incident debriefer at the site of the WTC attacks, counselling emergency workers. She took an entire month off from her job to do this. What an awesome lady!

In Irish Hearts the reader is treated to a tour of Colleen Keating's personal world as she sojourns towards new beginnings and refuses to allow her neglectful husband to hold her back from life's adventures. Colleen is a pioneer styled woman living in contemporary American who travels throughout England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland in search of her ancestral roots -- and finding more than she expected. Entangled within a loveless marriage, we empathize with her temptations when she encounters Ciaran Kelly, a handsome Irishman. Both of these star-crossed lovers are bound by commitments and experience the tug of hearts and distress of souls as the irrevocably find their mutual affections requited, yet forbidden. Irish Hearts is a superbly crafted novel of romance and responsibility, of unexpected opportunity and socially required sacrifice.

Well done. Haven,t read a romance in years. So glad I chose this one. The characters were so real Ifelt as though I was part of the story. I hope there is more to come from this author. She has a true feeling of life. As they say on Broadway,"author,author."

Steve Chapple's story of a kayak trip down the Yellowstone touches the heart of Montana and Montanans, describing the very soul of that elusive "Montana Spirit". It is a heartwarming book of family values and community, with the excitement of the kayak trip thrown in for good measure. His expertise with the language and his ability to describe makes this one of the best books I've read in recent years!

Big rivers fascinate me. Trips on them fascinate me even more. I liked his friendly way of writing about how he and his family paddled and puddled around on and off the river. His descriptions of surrounding country add to this story. I like a good story, and this is one.

Steve Chapple's story of a kayak trip down the Yellowstone touches the heart of Montana and Montanans, describing the very soul of that elusive "Montana Spirit". It is a heartwarming book of family values and community, with the excitement of the kayak trip thrown in for good measure. His expertise with the language and his ability to describe makes this one of the best books I've read in recent years!

Una excelente historia, de la cual uno puede aprender que todo hombre pasa por lo inevitable en el momento que menos lo espera, y aqui la leccion de esperanza ¿Hasta que punto podemos determinar nuestro destino? y lograr fortalecerse y aprender de ello y que cada persona logre determinar su propio camino, realmente un excelente libro ultra-recomendado :) !!!!

A beautifully witten short novel about a man who believes he is a prophet of God. The story's a little off beat and relies on the reader's belief in a higher being, but it doesn't really matter because the beauty of the novel lies in its language.

Este fue el primer y mas inspirador libro de Paulo Coehlo que he leido. De hecho lo prefiero a EL Alquimista.

Lo he leido tres veces y no dejo de aprender. Esta historia de Elias es motivadora, al ver a un profeta de Dios (Elias) a veces lleno de temor, otras de coraje, otras con fe y muchas otras con duda. Creo que lo que mas me gusta, es esa semejanza a nuestra realidad, pues aunque creamos en Dios, es humano que alguna veces dudemos y estemos en desacuerdo con el.
Si lo lees, te recomiendo que lo hagas lentamente, digiriendolo poco a poco, pues hay muchos mensajes que pueden pasar desapercibidos.

Terry Johnston writes like a man who was there as events unfolded. He leaves no doubt that he was there--not during the events, but at the locations. Weaving contemporary newspaper articles and original letters throughout the text firmly roots this novel in time and space. This, plus occasional historical footnotes quenches a historian's thirst for authenticity. It made me want to go and visit these places for myself, equipped with Johnton's literary visual aids.

Terry Johnston's "Lay the Mountains Low" is a must for the avid fan of western history. Part of the Plainsmen series, we are not gifted with the rugged Irishman Sheamus Donnegan, as he is on duty miles away trying to quell a different Indian uprising (this makes Johnston's writing less fictionalized)instead we fall in love with numerous characters both Native American and European. This is the second part to a trilogy about the Nez Perce War of 1877, focusing on the drama which occurred after the Battle of White Bird Canyon and culminating with the tragic Big Hole Battle. Johnston takes you to the campsite, the fort, the trail ride, the battle ridge, and makes you consider how you would stand up against the elements, enemy and morality. Without a doubt, this is Johnston's best piece of work and is a must read for all fans of the Great American West. Make special note to read the afterword as Johnston provides information on his fact-finding trips thoroughout the West. Johnston provides valuable information and insight to battle sites, cemeteries, forts and historical road-side stops...again, Johnston gives the reader a seat on the fifty yard line to some of our nation's most famous locations.

As always with Terry, a great book, an excellent way to learn about the history of the American West. If you are looking for a typical shootem up western this is not the book for you. This book is not for the faint hearted, there are few heros here, just a people fighting for their freedom and their lives against impossible odds. There is a lot of pain and and heart break here for both the Nez Perce and the whites, but mostly for the Nez Perce. This book really got to me, it was heart breaking reading what happened to the innocents on both sides. My family,s history goes back over 150 years in the west, so Terry,s books have special meaning for me. Read this book and you will never forget it.

Told partly in the form of letters, this is Jack Wade's painful journey from boy to man.
Jack has lived his life as a nomad since he left the wagon train where his father and sister died, existing from card game to card game. He runs from his emotions and from anything smacking of ties. His only bond is with his sister Callie, the recipient of his letters. He is on the run now because he is in trouble with the law. The man he used to ride with neglected to tell Jack that he was a wanted man, and when the law caught up with them last, Jack was lucky to escape with his life.
When he arrives in Virginia City at the Pair O' Dice, he meets Lillie and doesn't want to run any more. Jack and Lillie fall in love, but they have no time to do much at all about their feelings because trouble has caught up with Jack. He leaves Virginia City, intending to come back when things calm down, but then he is shot. When he comes to, he is in a Blackfoot village. As he heals from his wounds, his heart and soul heal as well. And helping in the healing process is a young Blackfoot widow named Raven....
There is joy and agony still awaiting Jack in this sometimes wrenching, sometimes glorious tale. Jack is not your typical hero--he has to learn lessons along the way, and sometimes he falls flat on his face. The reader suffers along with Jack but is also there for the triumphs and will laugh as well as cry with him.

When baby Rose died on the trek west, Jack Wade could not cope with the loss of his little sibling. Needing to mourn by himself and rethink his values, Jack leaves his family and the wagon train in Utah to head north.

However, a new guilt wracks Jack and he feels despondent that he abandoned his beloved sibling Callie. Still, he knew he could no longer remain with the wagon train because he was one of the prime supporters that persuaded the Wade family to go on the journey in the first place. To ameliorate his depression, Jack begins to write letters to Callie that describe what he has seen, how he feels, the nightmares he suffer over his losses including the women he loves, and his dismal hopes for his future.

LETTERS TO CALLIE: JACK WADE'S STORY is more of a historical journal that tells the adventures and misadventures of the hero. Jack's life is exciting as he becomes a gambler, deals with dangerous enemies, and falls in love. The companion piece to the powerfully descriptive THE JOURNAL OF CALLIE WADE is a stand-alone story that continues to portray the often-harsh life of settlers and pioneers. This is Americana historical fiction at its realistic best. It will dawn on genre fans that Ms. Miller is quite an artist painting the landscape of mid nineteenth century western America.

Harriet Klausner

If there's even one sentimental bone in your body, you'll love this writer's stories. Ms. Miller writes from her heart, and each and every paragraph will touch yours. As wonderful as "The Journal of Callie Wade" is, I think "Letters to Callie" is even better. A novel which is beautifully descriptive without being 'wordy', and with characters that will touch you deeply. I'm already itching to read the next installment in the saga of the Wade family!

This book will charm your heart and open your eyes to life, love, and pain in Nicaragua. Written by an anthropologist who was an intimate member of a small, middle class community in Managua, his stories are full of emotion, power, and a definite ring of truth. If you want to learn more about Nicaraguan culture and life from a verifiable source, this book is for you. A must-read for any traveler or potential immigrant to the region.

An interesting analysis of women in Managua during the Sandinista era takes up most of the book. Lancaster does much to explain how the combination of US aggression and Sandinista ineptitude wearied Nicaraguans and standed many women.

The book is padded with two academic articles. These not only clash in style with the rest of the book, but are based almost entirely on conjecture rather than ethnography. One is on race, the other on homosexuality. Astonishingly, Lancaster who eventually admits (that is the most accurate verb for how HE presents it) he is gay, did not study males who have sex with males in Nicaragua. Joseph Carrier, Don Kulick, Annick Prieur, and others have done ethnographic work with males who have sex with males, while Lancaster just recycles dubious majority culture conceptions of shame and honor.The data on racial conceptions are also very thin.

In sum, good on women and how the revolution was lived in a Managua barrio, but the last part of the book is marred by stereotyped fantases about race and homosexuality.

When people want to know what everyday life in Nicaragua was like during what Eduardo Galeano has called "the time of beautiful madness," they invariably turn to Lancaster's book. Life is Hard gives an up-close, personal, and often poignant accounting of the experiences of three working-class families during the Sandinista period. But this accessible, engaging book is also more than a classic ethnography. The latter chapters (whose theoretical arguments ineluctably flow from the more descriptive chapters) provide a highly readable short course on much of what is most exciting in twentieth century cultural theory: semiotics, deconstruction, neomarxism, and the origins of queer theory.

Over the course of the book, the author takes the reader through various vignettes, life stories, and analyses. At the same time, Lancaster reveals different facets of himself, in context-appropriate passages: socialist, Southern working-class origins, white, gay... The result is an implicit argument about how complex, compound, and contingent identities are. The result is also that alert readers get a very good sense of how the author's experiences shaped his research questions- and how they affected his interactions with Nicaraguan informants spanning a broad social gamut: single mothers, soldiers, adolescent boys and girls, "macho" men, and a number of gay men (clearly quoted, sometimes at length, in the chapter on same-sex relations).

Lancaster's overarching analysis is complex. In a feminist vein, he argues that the Sandinista revolution failed, in part, because its leadership failed to undertake an effective renovation of gender relations and family life. In a gay studies vein, the author shows how the everyday stigmatization of male same-sex relations regulates and supports conceptions of "appropriate" manhood (nobody wants to be called a "queer"!)-- and how, in no small part, it was this quotidian homophobia that undermined Sandinista efforts at changing family life.

The nuanced picture Lancaster draws of family life in a culture of machismo, and the innovative analysis he develops of how same-sex relations function in that culture, have been corroborated by a host of scholars working in different fields: Tomas Almaguer, Ana Alonso, Annick Prieuer, Don Kulick, David Whisnant, Richard Parker, and many others. With good reason, this important book received both the Society for the Study of Social Problems' C. Wright Mills Award, and the Society of Lesbian and Gay Anthropologists' Ruth Benedict Prize. I should add: this book has been used in several undergraduate and graduate courses I've taken. Invariably, students vote this the best-realized ethnography in the class.

I actually first picked up the book because of the authors featured in this compilation; the title gave me pause. But what I found within the pages of this book was both surprising and comforting.

While there is sex (shocking, isn't it?), that is not really what this book is all about. Each of the stories centers on a character who must make difficult choices that will affect not only his/her adolescence but also the moral character that will carry him/her into adulthood.

I very much enjoyed Sonya Sones story "Secret Shelf" because of the seamless prose and main character I first fell in love with in "What My Mother Doesn't Know." I also enjoyed "Extra Virgin" by Joan Bauer because it reminded me of my personal beliefs at that age. And my heart broke for Michael Lowenthal's main character in "The Acuteness of Desire," even though it was about a topic I struggle to relate with.

Each story is well written, and the genres vary while still holding any audiences attention and keeping with the theme. Each author is extremely talented, and the characters all ring true.

I must admit I fist pickes it up becuase I was intrigued by the title... Who wouldn't be? Some of the stories are longer then others but none of them exceed 30 pages. I liked that at the end of all the stories, the authors gave a meaningful explination of the story then there was a short bio about that author that you would most likely find on the jacket of one of their books.

I would highly recommened this if you are a fan of any of the authors in the book or even if not, Love & Sex could get you totally hooked on someone new.

"Love and Sex" is a collection of (very) short stories for teens. Each of the ten stories approaches a different aspect of love and/or sex and all the protagonists are teens. The first story is about a girl who wants to wait until marriage for sex -- which may put off teens from reading the other stories which are MUCH more focused on sex itself. As the parent of a teen, I squirmed at much of the material -- graphic and lurid at times (which should keep the teens' attention) but all of which will let each reader know that he/she is not alone in concerns about sex and relationships. Various types of attractions are covered including homosexual and inter-racial. Because each story is written by a different author, each has a different flavor and style. My favorite is a spooky, scf-fi type of allegory about control. All are well written with well drawn characters.